Linux on the desktop?

[Labster]

1ghz dual-core w/4gb ram is actually decently usable with L-/Xubuntu, but I'd recommend double that at the minimum, and 16gb for futureproofing. 2

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Note that what you described is about the specs of a Raspberry Pi 4 -- the 4GB model. But at $55 even the maxed out model is pretty cheap. Still, because it's an ARM chip, you might end up on Raspbian which is nice enough, but stripped down in odd ways. (Like, it doesn't come with vim installed.)

I'm not sure I'd recommend the Pi for non-enthusiasts, though. For a simpler desktop experience, I'd choose one of the Ubuntu variants, or the closely related Linux Mint. But since I do most of my work on Apple products, I'm not a distro connoisseur.